


After the Storm

by DjaqtheRipper



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Canonical Character Death, F/M, Family, Friends to Lovers, Incomplete, M/M, One-Sided Attraction, Parent!lock, Parenthood, Season/Series 04, Season/Series 04 Spoilers, Slow Build
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-27
Updated: 2017-03-17
Packaged: 2018-09-20 04:38:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,431
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9476039
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DjaqtheRipper/pseuds/DjaqtheRipper
Summary: After dragging him through hell and back time after time, somehow they had emerged together- battered, grieving, and exhausted- but together again, at the end of it all. Somehow they always do. Deduction is the natural conclusion of an understanding of existing patterns. Patterns form, and he would be a poor detective indeed not to notice them. Mary noticed, certainly.“If I’m gone, then I know what you two can become.”Or, post- Season 4 John and Sherlock find out what they could become.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers for Season 4!  
> Could be read as a continuation of "Could That Be Enough?"  
> Stuffed diseases: http://www.giantmicrobes.com/us/main/diseases
> 
> Tune in next time for John's side of the story...

He’s finally convinced John Watson to stay. 

It’s late now, halfway between dark and dawn. The street outside is quiet, but in the distance Sherlock can make out the sounds of traffic- the last buses of the day rattling towards the station, the odd car whistling past, out of sight. Baker Street is still and silent, taking its rest at the end of a long day. It’s silly to personify it in such a fashion, but the analogy is accurate. 221 B, in particular, deserves rest. It still smells like construction- sawdust and wallpaper glue and aerosol paint- but over that there’s the smell of people, of all the thin traces clients carry on themselves and deposit on the slightly singed chairs in the siting room. The bring cigarette smoke and ocean air and the damp heat of the underground with them and they leave more behind then they mean to. On top of that, the olfactory clues about the flat’s more regular inhabitants. John Watson, with his hospital antiseptic, and something clean and male and warm that he can’t quite scrub off. Rosie, spilled baby formula and talcum powder. Home. 

John is asleep upstairs. ‘Just for tonight,’ he’d managed around a jaw-splitting yawn, after the case had wrapped up after midnight, left in the hands of one of Lestrade’s less incompetent cronies so that Sherlock could address the fact that John had been asleep on his feet since they got to the police station an hour previous. Rosie had been brought along in her carrier, after Sherlock had assured John many times over that it was a burglary and the suspect wasn’t dangerous. 

_“Getting her into trouble?” Mary had playfully chastised from his Mind Palace._

“Like mother, like daughter,” he’d said, and she’d laughed. 

Though Sherlock hoped that regular exposure to his Work would develop her detective skills, for the time being Rosie was content to babble in a language all her own before finally falling asleep in her carrier, her head bobbing gently against John’s chest from midway through the apprehension of the suspect and the entirety of the debrief at Scotland Yard. (Sherlock insisted to John, ‘Of course she was paying attention, didn’t you see how excited she was when they put the handcuffs on him?!’) Two a.m. found them back at 221B, John rubbing his eyes quizzically like he wasn’t sure how he’d gotten there. 

_They’re laughing at something, Sherlock can’t recall what, and there is a familiar rush coursing through his veins. John Watson home at last, at Sherlock’s side where he belongs, as though he’d never left. In that moment, Sherlock remembers how they were, what they could become again- heroes, back to back against the rest of the world. He meets John’s eyes and sees it there too, that spark, a tremendous fire contained. Then John’s jaws split into a monumental yawn and suddenly John is just a man with an early shift tomorrow and the weight of the world on his shoulders._

“I should go home,” he says, checking his pockets for his keys with his left hand, stroking Rosie’s hair with his right. 

John will leave. John will leave, taking Rosie with him, and that spark will fade and Sherlock will be alone once more. 

The bed upstairs is still empty, at Mrs. Hudson’s insistence. She knows that John belongs here, Sherlock’s overheard her trying to convince him to come back, take up his old room. (“That flat is too big for two people,” she told him, her voice echoing in from the hallway. “Too lonely.”) The sheets are clean, the room is swept and bare and waiting for John to return. There’s a play crib for Rosie in the living room, a purchase Sherlock had made, then fiddled with for hours trying to put the damn thing together. There are stuffed animal bacteria from Molly- her favorites are a ruffled green gangrene with googly eyes and a plush pancreatic beta cell- and a nest of blankets that had migrated over from John’s flat. There’s a set of baby bottles that had been a gift from Mrs. Hudson, a decade and a half old bottle warmer that had been a hand-me-down from Lestrade’s children, all consigned to their own kitchen cabinet, scrubbed clean of spilled chemicals and the remains a shattered beaker. Mycroft gave Sherlock a baby monitor (though the tag had read, ‘To Sherlock and Dr. Watson’) because of course Mycroft would equate “baby” with audio surveillance. Sherlock had agreed to childproof the kitchen and other hazard areas before John would even consider bringing Rosie over, so now there are bulbous plastic safety plugs in all the open sockets and rounded rubber corners on the sharp edges of his furniture. Somehow, Sherlock has made room in his home and his life for a child, and as he looks around at the container of formula on the kitchen table and the stuffed microbes on the floor, what he wants to say is ‘Everything I’ve done is for you, John.’ 

Instead, he says, “You could stay here tonight.” When John looks like he’s going to protest, Sherlock pushes on. “The room upstairs is empty, and Rosie has a crib here. You have to be at work in six hours and you can sleep for longer if you don’t waste time trying to make it across town. Your patients will prefer their doctor well-rested.” 

John looks like he wants to argue but thinks better of it. As if to prove Sherlock’s point, he yawns again, eyes watering with tiredness. 

“Okay, you win,” he says. 

It takes him less than ten minutes to put Rosie to bed, tucking her in and kissing her on the forehead. When he’s finished Sherlock offers him a tee shirt and sweats left over from playing junkie. John takes them without comment, though Sherlock isn’t sure whether that’s just because he’s too tired to argue. He takes the baby monitor with him, but Sherlock shuts it off as soon is John is out of eyeshot. Better to let him rest. Sherlock’s room is close enough to hear if Rosie wakes up. Besides, Sherlock is fresh off a case and far too wired to sleep. 

Three o’clock finds Sherlock at his computer, solving some simple cases through his website, categorizing the rest as “BORING” and “Less Boring.” Eventually he realizes he’s hungry and calls for take away. He eats his curry in front of the computer screen, searching for something interesting and finding nothing. That’s not entirely true. There’s something infinitely more interesting asleep upstairs. In the quiet dark of the early hours, Sherlock searches for a case but all he finds is John. 

The better part of Sherlock’s life (“The _best_ parts,” he would say) he has been married to his Work. He called it a marriage because it was what he had committed himself to, for better or worse, richer or poorer, till death do they part. It was the closest he thought he’d ever come to the kind of matrimonial solidarity experienced by normal people. He never thought there would be a person he’d want to devote his life to. 

And then there was John Watson who remained fascinating through countless dull cases, who has been the best part of his life. Sherlock claimed he was married to his work because it was what he’d devoted his life to, but here, in the stillness of a sleeping house he is willing to admit to himself that he will choose John over work every time. Somewhere between the first time they met and this moment, where John sleeps on silently unaware, Sherlock had chosen to devote his life to John. If his existing categorical schema dictates that what he dedicates his life to is what he chooses to marry, then Sherlock has chosen to marry John Watson. Schemas are terribly useful ways to process information, filter out the boring from the necessary. John has his own set of schemas. Sherlock has never held with the absurd idea of marriage as an institution, but at least it’s part of a schema that John understands. 

His devotion to Rosie belongs to an entirely different form of reasoning. Rosie’s mother had died to save Sherlock. That level of sacrifice carries unknowable weight- as Sherlock had told John, it was a currency he didn’t know how to spend. The answer of how to spend it came with further reflection. Mary’s dying words to him were “Take care of Rosie.” In her final breaths as she died for him, she gave him her daughter. The title of godparent means little to men who think themselves gods- it’s a title more than it’s an obligation. Mary’s death made Sherlock understand the depth of his obligation. He owes his life to Rosamund Watson- little Rosie, asleep in her crib, not knowing that she will grow up without a mother thanks to Sherlock Holmes. 

It was weeks after Mary’s funeral before John let Sherlock hold his daughter again. Sherlock had tried to avoid it before, generally confused by the noise and the mess, terrified equally by how _delicate_ the strange new red-faced noise machine was and by the fact that it was another person to take John away from him. He knew it was selfish, childish, but part of him resented the infant. But then Mary was gone and there was no room for selfishness, no room to be a child when there was an actual child to take care of. His discomfort with the soiled nappies and projectile spit up evaporated and were replaced by awe at the fact of the human being in his hands. Literally, in his hands. The first time he held her after Mary, the first time he held her with the knowledge of what he owed her, Rosie fit in the crook of his arm. Her entire head- _soft skull, cranial sutures leaving room for expansion; bendable, breakable_ \- was dwarfed by the hand cradling it. She was warm, soft, and painfully fragile. For a few moments he froze in sheer terror at the thought of the innumerable ways he could hurt her by accident, just by not paying attention. His thoughts fled to greenstick fractures and cranial damage, pinched fingers, how absurdly small her toes were, how Mary was gone and what the hell was he supposed to do, how on earth was he supposed to do this, he’d failed her, failed Mary, failed John, but most importantly failed Rosie- 

Then her eyes blinked open and he stopped thinking at all. In that moment, the only thing in his head was her, her scrunched up eyes (still birth-blue), the warm pressure of her slow breathing, her impossibly tiny hands opening and closing fruitlessly. In that instant, he understood that failure was not an option. He could not fail Rosie Watson. 

And he would not fail John. He had failed John so many times, in so many ways. Somehow, John had always come back. After dragging him through hell and back time after time, somehow they had emerged together- battered, grieving, and exhausted- but together again, at the end of it all. Somehow they always do. Deduction is the natural conclusion of an understanding of existing patterns. Patterns form, and he would be a poor detective indeed not to notice them. Mary noticed, certainly. 

_“If I’m gone, then I know what you two can_ become.”

Whatever they are, whatever they’ll become, they’ll emerge together. The patterns are clear: when John Watson and Sherlock Holmes are separated, the world falls apart. This time, Sherlock understands what he has to lose. He can’t risk that separation again. There’s just one (very large) problem. 

John Watson is a good man, too kind of a man to tell his best friend that he’s not interested. He’s also a very smart man, and there is no way in hell that he hasn’t noticed that every risk Sherlock has taken in the last three years, he’s taken because he loves John Watson. Sherlock is torn between frustration- _say something, anything_ \- at John’s apparent ignorance and fear that John would leave if he ever confronted him about it. The only thing in the world that Sherlock could not tolerate would be having to be without John Watson again, after everything they’ve survived together. Sherlock never thought he’d have a friend- he certainly never thought he’d experience something so quintessentially human and emotional as romantic love. He’s compared his experience with experiences he’s heard described, he’s filtered it through the schemas of Eros, and there’s another pattern emerging. Emerged, really, though how long ago, he’s not comfortable saying. Remembering the persistent constriction in his chest at John’s wedding, like being deprived of air and dying very slowly, the pattern emerged quite some time ago. Mary’s words echo around a sealed wing in his Mind Palace: “If I’m gone, then I know what you two can _become.”_ He wonders if she knew something he didn’t, clever as she was. Clever as she is, the version of her that Sherlock talks to when he changes Rosie’s diapers, when John is sleep-deprived and ill-tempered, or when he’s eating take-out alone between cases in a flat that really ought to hold two (or three) people. 

There’s yearning, aching and strange. The way John’s laugh made Sherlock’s heart race, how watching him play with Rosie felt like witnessing everything he’d ever wanted hover just beyond his reach. That strange warmth in Sherlock’s chest watching John help Mrs. Hudson with her housework, the sting in his eyes watching John and Mary waltz on their wedding night. Then came the _wanting_ , sharp and breathless and burning. First, wanting John to look at him the way he looked at his wife, that warmth in his eyes, that belonging. Wanting the heady timbre in his voice in the early hours after a hard case- sleepy and satisfied, and enough that Sherlock can imagine… Then, wanting touch. Contact- a handshake, a hug, a clap on the shoulder, anything. Now Sherlock wants the single most damning thing he can possibly want: Sherlock wants John’s body. He wants the rough warmth of his hands, the press of his ribs expanding with breath, he wants to touch all the skin he can only imagine. He wants to kiss him ( _and kiss him and kiss him and kiss him_ ) to gather data, to see what it feels like. To show John how he feels, in a language John is accustomed to. Sherlock, for the first time in his life, wants sex. Another of those bizarre things that people uniformly put far too much stock in. Sweat and genital fluids and more mess, STI risks and all the nonsensical emotional ramifications- all of it confusing, overrated. The Woman made him wonder, but she didn’t make him _want_ the way John did. John can make Sherlock’s mouth water, make his pupils dilate, his pulse elevate, but somehow he’s never called Sherlock on these physiological responses. Sherlock didn’t want sex until he realized that he wanted everything with John, wanting the grunting and the sweating, the foolish absurdity of it all. He can’t imagine wanting that with anyone else. 

Sherlock isn’t one for pointless self-indulgence, but John has decided to stay tonight- it’s a special enough occasion that he feels it warrants a bit of self indulgence. So, Sherlock imagines. From the quiet sitting room of 221B, Sherlock considers the warm body asleep in the bed upstairs. For a moment, he lets himself pretend that later tonight he’ll close up the laptop, kiss his sleeping daughter on the forehead and click the baby monitor back on so he can climb the stairs and crawl into bed with the man he loves. He imagines how John would feel, warm and sleepy, half-awake when Sherlock slips under the sheets, smiling slightly and teasing him about the lateness of the hour and the curry on his breath. Sherlock’s chest aches and he forces himself to stop. He reminds himself that John is here, and that he would do anything to keep John here, even if that means John never knows what Sherlock thinks of when it’s four in the morning and the world is quiet and still. 


	2. A Word on John Watson

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> John's version of events and headcanon on John's sexual orientation.

At six-thirty the next morning, John is woken by his phone alarm. He doesn’t notice until after he’s shut it off that it’s on a different nightstand than usual, that it echoes more loudly in a room much smaller than the one he shared with Mary. Then, he remembers. The case, Sherlock, Rosie asleep downstairs. 221B is silent- when he lived here with Sherlock John would’e welcomed the reprieve from the rattling, crashing, splintering, banging noises of Sherlock in the throes of boredom, but with Rosie here the quiet is unnerving. Rubbing sleep from his eyes, John checks the baby monitor on the nightstand. Nothing, not even white noise. Someone’s shut the monitor off. 

John’s halfway down the stairs before the thoughts can coalesce- _Sherlock has enemies, we both do, and Eurus has escaped unnoticed before_ \- and his heart is pounding painfully before he reaches the landing. There’s a steely calm setting in, the calm that John called on as a Captain, when fear is allowed only insofar as it is useful. Hands steady, John opens the door to the downstairs, strides purposefully to the crib in the living room only to find it empty. John swallows back something rising in his throat and searches the rest of the flat. The kitchen and bathroom yield no sign of either Rosie or Sherlock. John isn’t sure if that makes him more or less nervous. Sherlock has been doing well with his goddaughter- excellent, really, better than even John could’ve expected- but he’s still Sherlock. The only room John hasn’t examined is Sherlock’s bedroom, the door to which is closed. Forcing himself to breathe, John crosses the hallway. The only sound is the creaking of the boards under his feet. No sound from behind the door. The knob is cold in his hand. It creaks sharply when he turns it. The door swings wide, John ducked behind it as though for cover, old reflexes setting in, then he’s inside the room, and for a moment John forgets to breathe. 

Rosie is fast asleep, lying on Sherlock’s chest. The covers are still on the bed, and Sherlock’s wearing yesterday’s clothes, but he’s dead asleep. He’s constructed a wall of pillows around the outside of the bed - _so Rosie doesn’t roll off,_ John’s brain helpfully supplies. There’s a half-finished bottle on the nightstand. 

The unuttered fears that had been racing through John’s brain from the moment he woke up evaporate instantaneously. Something else creeps in to take their place- something warm and heavy that’s making John’s eyes sting. He exhales sharply, trying to force it back, not aided by the fact that he knows somewhere Mary is smiling. If she were here, he knows they’d be giggling together, that she’d insist upon taking a picture for later. But Mary’s gone, and now it’s just John watching Sherlock’s breath stir Rosie’s hair, observing from the outside how well they fit together. From where he’s standing, John feels utterly alone, on the outside looking in. The raw ache of loneliness wars with something that might be pride, witnessing the perfect creature that is his daughter, seeing Sherlock self-actualize in front of him. John watches, and more than anything wants to curl up with them, rest his head on Sherlock’s shoulder, hold Rosie in his arms and stop being alone.

INTERLUDE: A WORD ON JOHN WATSON 

Doctor John Watson is not gay. 

He isn’t exactly 100% straight either. 

Mary knew. It took him months to open up about Sherlock, but when he did, Mary’s first question, after talking for a solid forty minutes over paper cups of tea on a beautiful fall Sunday in Hyde Park, was “Did you love him?” 

John’s response? “You of all people should know that I’m not gay.” 

Mary’s smile, slow and sweet and sad, her hand curling around his gently. “That wasn’t what I asked.” 

He didn’t have to say anything to that. In a single look she could read everything. She was always able to do that with John. Just look at him and know. Look at him and know that he needed to be alone, look at him and know that they should go for a walk, just to get out, go anywhere. Look at him and coax him into renting a comedy and drinking crap beer after a bad day at work. So of course Mary knew how he felt about Sherlock.

The one thing Mary never knew about was Arthur. 

John has always liked women. The men in his outfit called him “Three Continent Watson,” and not without good reason. But occasionally there were men that he noticed. Not enough to try anything with them, just a physical awareness that he wouldn’t _mind_ trying anything with them. But then John Watson joined the military and made himself stop noticing. 

Then he met Arthur. Arthur was a medic, one of the Fusiliers. He had a smile like a lightning storm, and never an unkind word for anyone. He had quick hands and a wry sense of humor, a love of classic rock and an ability to tell stories that could make anyone sit down and shut up and listen. They worked well together. They could perform surgery without speaking, just a seamless flow of communication without words. They were an excellent team and together they saved lives. It was good, it was everything John had hoped for when he’d joined the army. Every night, at the return to barracks, Arthur would clap John on the back and say, “Well done, Watson,” and smile like a clap of lightning, thunder rolling and sending the hairs on the back of John’s neck stand straight up, and John would smile back, and that would be enough. 

There was a bad day. A very bad day, the kind of day you spend in blood up to your elbows with the smell of singed flesh and gunpowder burning in your nose. They lost someone, a new recruit who died in pain, in terror, on their operating table. Dark fell long before they finished the day’s work. Then the last man had been patched up and the tables had been sanitized and John had scrubbed himself clean and somehow “Well done, Watson,” wasn’t going to cut it and quite frankly, wasn’t true. 

So Arthur clapped John on the shoulder, a little too rough, like he was seeking an anchor, and before he could pull his hand away, John muttered “Don’t.” John himself wasn’t sure if it referred to the “Well done, Watson,” that was probably coming, or if he was telling Arthur not to pull away. Whichever it was, Arthur got it. He didn’t say anything to John- he didn’t have to. Their wordless understanding extended beyond the operating table. They looked at each other for a moment, Arthur’s hand spread warm over John’s back, and the lightning that usually struck with Arthurs smile instead was sparking in his eyes. After hours of violence and death, John would’ve given anything to feel just a little of the life he could see in Arthur’s eyes. So he kissed him. 

Arthur’s hands tightened in the fabric of John’s shirt, a low growl surged from the depths of his chest, and for a split second John expected to be shoved away, thrown to the ground. Instead, he found himself pulled closer and kissed furiously. In the heat of the moment, it was so much more than John had ever thought it could be, on the rare occasions he found himself thinking about doing such a thing. Together, they burned. It was fast, passionate to the point of brutality. There was pain, but pain was a reminder that he was alive, so pain was welcome. John left the med-bay with bruises that he prodded the next day with deep satisfaction. He was certain he left more than a few bruises of his own. 

John didn’t love Arthur. He never got the chance to. 

Two weeks later, Arthur was dead on John Watson’s operating table. 

From then on, on the rare occasions John Watson met a man he might be interested in, all he could think of was Arthur’s face with half the brains blown out. John would look at an attractive man and see only death. It was easier to forget, after that, and anyways, John had always preferred women. 

Then John met Sherlock Holmes. Irene Adler was right- with Sherlock it wasn’t about sex- gay, straight, whatever- it wasn’t about men, it was about _Sherlock._ It was about the cases, the adventures, the sheer absurdity of the man. The way he could make John feel alive in a dead world, the fact that Sherlock had indisputably saved him. It was about the rush of the chase, and the beauty of the stars through London smog, and being two against the world. No one in John’s life had ever made him feel the way Sherlock could, John was certain, even from the beginning, that no one else ever would. It wasn’t about whether he loved Sherlock ( _which he did_ ) or whether he was attracted to him ( _which he was, eventually_ ) - it was about the fact that they were _Sherlock_ bloody _Holmes_ and Dr. John Watson and they were worth far more together than apart. It was about the fact that John needed Sherlock, just as much as Sherlock needed John. After everything they’ve been through and emerged from together, that had been thoroughly proven. 

If he sometimes considered what it would be like to have sex with the man, well, that was nobody’s business but his. 

During the time they lived together at 221B, John felt like he’d been trying to run away from Sherlock, trying to resist how much he needed him, how badly he wanted him in his life. There were women- who he hardly remembers- and the constant assertion to Scotland Yard, to Mrs. Hudson, to every stranger he encountered, that they weren’t a couple. John Watson is used to taking care of himself. The thought of needing anyone the way John needed Sherlock was absolutely terrifying, so John denied it. So John pushed himself away from Sherlock, trying to maintain boundaries where he could, trying to resist the way he could feel them merging together, feel Sherlock bleeding into the rest of his life. John could tell where they’d begun to fuse, could tell that a separation would be impossible, would be more than either of them could survive. 

Then Sherlock jumped off the roof of St. Bart’s, and John spent months lying awake an wondering if he hadn’t kept pushing Sherlock away, if Sherlock wouldn’t have jumped. If John had told Sherlock that he loved him, would Sherlock still be alive? John would’ve given anything to have him back, to do it right this time, to bring him closer instead of pushing him away. But time passed, as time does, and John tried to heal, tried to move on from a separation he knew was crippling. John met Mary, who was brilliant, Mary who taught him to smile again, who could make him laugh at nothing, Mary who was everything John wanted. John wasn’t okay, but he was _better_ and it wasn’t as good as it would’ve been with Sherlock there, with that strange other piece of his life returned, but goddamnit, it was _enough_ . 

After two years, Sherlock came back. He came back and John was _furious_ because this time it was **Sherlock** who was running away, **Sherlock** who had left him alone and guilty. Sherlock was back and John was angry, but there was still Mary. Mary who _liked_ Sherlock, and tried to push them back together again, and in so doing proved why she would be the woman he’d marry. John Watson and Sherlock Holmes were a package deal, even after two years apart and rough-healed wounds from a painful separation, and Mary, brilliant as she was, understood immediately what she was getting into. She tried to bring them together because Mary knew John better than he knew himself and recognized that John needed Sherlock in his life. She brought John and Sherlock together, then John married her and drove them apart again. 

John thought he’d fixed everything. The world was the way it was supposed to be: John was happily married, Sherlock was back on Baker St. solving cases, right where he was meant to be. John didn’t understand why it wasn’t working, why Sherlock relapsed within weeks of the wedding, why Sherlock is being reckless, and stupid, and is _with a woman_ for Christ’s sake. He’s received to hear that it’s all for a case, and he’s happy to put the prickle of jealousy to rest. Somehow, even once he meets Charles Augustus Magnussen something still feels off, like the case is just an excuse for Sherlock to self-destruct. All the clues are starting to come together- Sherlock’s best man speech, watching him through the crowd as he left the wedding early, the nosedive after John’s wedding- the pieces are there, but John is completely unwilling to address them or try to put them together. Then the revelation of Mary’s background tears the ground out from under him and John forgets about Sherlock. He’s absorbed entirely with his-wife-the-liar, his-wife-the-killer, the pain of betrayal, the sharper pain of knowing that Sherlock’s right, that he _does_ love her because of all the reasons he should despise her. He’s fixated on Mary, on the child she’s carrying, on the fact that everything he knows about her is a lie, so he forgets about Sherlock’s strange behavior. 

Then Sherlock kills a man for him and it all makes sense. Everything falls into place. John asks Mary that night, when Sherlock has been incarcerated, if Sherlock is in love with him. Mary gives him that sad, knowing smile, and says, “Of course he is.” John has nothing to say to that, but he feels like he’s drowning, like he’s just watched his future be led off in chains. He has nowhere to turn but to his lying assassin wife (who is beautiful, and brilliant, and continues to be the best thing that could’ve happened to him), so he lets himself be guided into her arms, lets her stroke his hair and hold him. She can be so gentle, and even when he’s angry at her that gentleness finds a way around his defenses. He takes her to bed that night, and they make love like mourning, and he’s not sure who he’s mourning for exactly, Sherlock, or himself, or the shattered lie that Mary had created. 

After another great loss, another painful deception, John heals. Slowly, though not as slowly as last time. He laughs, if not as freely as he used to, smiles, though not as often. He relearns Mary, relearns her body as it changes with their child. They discuss baby names, design a wavering future, and slowly he begins to forgive her. He thinks of Sherlock, often, of where he’s been taken since the night at Appledore. He thinks of Sherlock and 221B and being two against the world. He tries not to think of roads not taken, of the things neither of them managed to say. Instead, John thinks about the future. He thinks of his daughter. He cringes at the thought of telling her about Sherlock and their old adventures. Sherlock finds his way into John’s head, no matter how he tried to avoid him. 

They meet on the tarmac as Sherlock prepares to board a plane that will take him far away from John. John doesn’t know for how long. That’s one more on the list of Things John is Trying Not to Think About. They’re on the blacktop, and they’re talking without saying anything, but John _knows_ now, can read the subtext in everything Sherlock says. Sherlock says there’s something he needs to tell John, and John understands. Sherlock plays it as a joke, and it’s a mercy, really, that Sherlock isn’t leaving John by dropping that particular bomb. It remains unspoken, but John hears it anyway. John has wife and a baby on the way, there’s nothing he can offer in return. Perhaps Sherlock’s mercy is for himself as well, sparing himself from rejection. 

Moriarty’s revenge, then. Eurus, though they didn’t know that yet. The Six Thatchers, that stupid case that John will never forget, because it was the case where he lost Mary. She died in his arms, and every path they’d forged together, the long uphill battle of recovery and betrayal and forgiveness and the strange glory of parenthood, all was for nothing because Mary was dead. Worse, Mary had died for Sherlock. Mary was always so clever, and had always known John better than John knew himself. He wonders if she saw something in him, something that made her think Sherlock’s life meant more to him than hers. The guilt is so raw he can’t quite comprehend it, and it comes out as rage- rage at Sherlock, rage at Mary for leaving him alone with their daughter, rage at the world for the fact that everything that goes wrong in his life is somehow inevitably John’s fault. His little girl, his Rosie, looked so much like her mother that h couldn’t bear to see her. One more failure, passing her off to friends as though he doesn’t want her. Really, he just can’t bear to fail her, and he trusts almost anyone more than himself. Almost anyone. Anyone except Sherlock. 

The events with Eurus unfold, and John has to admit to himself that it’s not Sherlock’s fault, it was never Sherlock’s fault. John finds that every time he forgives it gets easier. Every time he’s loved it has gotten harder. 

After everything, after being dug up from a child’s grave at the bottom of a well, after being saved once more by Sherlock Holmes, all is forgiven. John forgives Sherlock this time partially because there’s honestly nothing to forgive, and mostly because after everything they’ve been through together- the thousand cases, the shared laughter at inside jokes, the misplaced stares, the whims and obligations of the British Government, the death of the woman they both loved- when all is said and done it has always just been the two of them. Mary’s final video was absolutely right. _‘I know what you could become,’_ she’d said, and she’d known, of course she’d known, what that could mean. They’ve survived yet again, and emerged together from hell. At the end of the day, though, it’s less a matter of being two against the world together and more the fact that John Watson is so very, _very_ tired of running away from Sherlock Holmes. He’s not old, but he feels it. Two massive losses and betrayals in less than four years have aged him sorely, and now John just wants something to come home to. The only thing John wants from the world is to raise his daughter in peace. Now, life with Sherlock has never exactly been peaceful, but John can recognize home when he’s found it. John wants a co-parent for Rosie, and though he knows no one ( **no one** ) will ever take the place of her mother, Sherlock is trying his best to be the kind of parent she deserves. John notices what Sherlock is doing, what every action says. He’s trying to be everything John needs, and he is by and large succeeding. It’s more than John would’ve hoped for, and far more than he would ever think to ask for. This isn’t the life he’d planned, and it isn’t the life he would’ve thought he’d wanted, but it’s the life he has, and he will happily take it. 

END INTERLUDE: A WORD ON JOHN WATSON 

John stirs himself from watching his sleeping family. (Sherlock’s term, not his, during his argument with Mycroft. _‘This is family,’_ Mycroft said of the issue of Eurus. _‘That’s why John stays!’_ Sherlock had countered, and god but hadn’t that made John’s chest constrict warmly.) He has to be at work in just under an hour. John needs to prepare to leave- he considers waking Sherlock, but concludes that Rosie is in good hands and he can get ready faster if she’s taken care of. He hasn’t lived here in quite some time, but even in light of the recent repairs and renovations the flat hasn’t changed much. Certainly, the shower hasn’t moved. Sherlock won’t mind- probably won’t notice- if John steals some of his soap and shampoo, borrows his razor. John showers quickly, then retrieves yesterday’s clothes from upstairs. It’s a little sloppy, but it’ll do. By the time he’s got his shoes on and returned downstairs, he’s got forty minutes to work with. 

Once more, he eases the door to Sherlock’s bedroom open. They’ve hardly moved. John takes exactly sixty seconds to appreciate how wonderful they are and how much he adores them before he debates the best way to wake them up. ( _Kiss them,_ comes to mind. He ignores it.) He decides to just get Rosie- it’s Mrs. Hudson’s day, and he can drop her off on his way to work. He approaches the bed softly, fits his hands under her arms and lifts her gently, sitting her against his hip. She wakes slightly, blue eyes blinking open then closing once more. Her tiny fingers grab at the air for purchase, finally embedding themselves in John’s shirt. John smiles before he can help it and uses his finger to comb through the mess of her hair, pick at a small green spot where dinner must’ve landed the night before. By the time the green spot has been obliterated, Sherlock has opened his eyes and is observing John and Rosie quietly. 

“She woke up, “ Sherlock offers helpfully.

“I gathered,” John says. “You turned the baby monitor off.” 

Sherlock shifts slightly, sitting up. “You were tired. I wasn’t. It was a logical decision.” 

“It worried me,” John mutters, “when I woke up. I thought maybe-“ 

“I’m sorry to have worried you,” Sherlock’s voice is gravelly with sleep. His hair is a mess, and his clothes are wrinkled. John thinks that he wouldn’t mind waking up to the sight of him, then pushes the thought aside. 

“It’s alright. Thanks for looking after her.” Rosie shifts in her sleep and John begins to bounce her gently. Rosie stills once more. Over her, Sherlock’s eyes meet John’s. 

“Who is she with today?” Sherlock asks. 

“Mrs. Hudson. I was going to drop her on my way out.” 

“I could drop her,” Sherlock says, standing. “No new case today. I wouldn’t mind having someone to keep me busy.” John considers the sleeping baby in his arms, considers the bedraggled Sherlock in front of him.

“If you’re sure.” John helps Sherlock collect Rosie. She moves about for a moment, confused at the change, before returning to sleep in Sherlock’s arms. John bends and kisses her forehead, mumbles “Love you, Rosie, bye bye” into her hair. When he straightens, he is caught off guard by his proximity to Sherlock. His face is closer than John had thought, his eyes bright. For just an instant, John thinks of kissing Sherlock goodbye too. It would be easy- shift his weight to his toes, lean in, they’re close enough that it could almost happen by accident. Sherlock inclines his head, and the distance is halved. They’re breathing the same air, caught between them. It would be easy, and John is leaving, they needn’t discuss it now, Sherlock’s eyes are soft, and when he looks at him John doesn’t know how but he realizes that Sherlock is thinking the same thing. His face is open, hopeful, and John can’t quite bear to do this to him right now, to leave him for the day and not explain. There’s a conversation that needs to happen, but it’s not one that can happen now if John wants to be at work on time. 

John pulls away. Instantly, Sherlock’s face closes up and his eyes harden, as though that yearning had never been there. Immediately regretful, John puts his hand on Sherlock’s shoulder, squeezes once, and says, “I’ll see you tonight, Sherlock.” 

“Tonight?” Sherlock asks, voice unnaturally even, “I don’t have a case on tonight.” 

John’s crossed the room before he finishes, hand on the doorknob.

John takes a final look at what he’s leaving behind- Sherlock and his clear eyes, his large hands, Rosie, in all her perfection, curled up in his arms. “I know,” John says, and leaves.


	3. The One Where Sherlock Babysits

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock watches Rosie for a day. (Short one, sorry.)

John drives to work cursing himself, wondering what in the hell _that_ was about, what he’s going to say tonight. He thinks of what people will say (always _people,_ some nameless, faceless mass of disapproving onlookers), he thinks of how little time has passed since he lost Mary. It seems gauche to be thinking of Sherlock as anything other than his best friend when Mary is so recently interred, especially since she’d died to save Sherlock. It’s the cruelest kind of joke. _Here he is,_ it seems to say, _take him._ So brief a mourning period, and yet… From the moment he met Sherlock his life has been a matter of falling towards him, falling together. Death itself had failed to keep them apart. 

Then there’s Rosie to think of. Rosie, who probably won’t retain any memory of her mother. The thought never fails to make a lump swell in John’s throat. Mary would’ve been an unparalleled mother, and John regrets achingly that she didn’t have the chance to become one. He mourns his wife for all that she was, but also for all she never got to be. He mourns the mother his daughter never got to know and love. No one can replace Mary. No one will suffice as a substitute for Rosie’s mother. John will grieve Mary for as long as he lives, because every time he looks at his daughter he sees the imprint of the woman who bore her.

And yet. John will not raise Rosie alone- he has built himself an army of caretakers and guardians. Mrs. Hudson, Molly, the godmothers. Sherlock. Sherlock, who has already far surpassed his expectations, who ( _god help us all_ ) is watching Rosie right now. John still doesn’t know what to make of him volunteering to look after her. _He must be terribly bored. At any rate, he can pass her over to Mrs. Hudson if an interesting case comes up._

Then there’s the matter of what he’s going to say to Sherlock when he sees him later tonight. What is there to say? _I wish I didn’t want you?_ Better yet, _my wife died taking a bullet for you, please raise my infant daughter with me?_ There’s no good way to give voice to the chaos building in John’s head, a confusion of yearning and loneliness and paralyzing fear that he’s going to get it all wrong with Sherlock, worse, with Rosie, that he’s going to fail them both. There’s calm at the eye of the storm: the persistent image of the two of them fast asleep this morning, the almost painful pull to stop thinking for long enough to join them in bed, pull them close and refuse to let go. 

These thoughts chase each other through John’s mind through a day of work that would otherwise be tedious, made almost unbearable by the way his brain feels sluggish due to last night’s sleep deprivation. It’s a long day, made longer by the way Sherlock is taking up far too much of the space behind his eyes. 

The real Sherlock, meanwhile, is utterly occupied with the tiny human he has taken responsibility for. 

The day goes something like this: 

7:34 am: Sherlock warms a bottle, which he feeds to Rosie while he sits at the kitchen table, scanning his blog for new cases. 

7:50 am: No new cases, or at least none worth looking at. Sherlock puts Rosie in her high chair (from Harry- John didn’t like it as much as the one Mary had been given at her baby shower, so it had taken up residence at 221B) so that he may continue with an experiment involving submerging several human organs in baths of varying acidity for set increments of time to determine how acidity impacts decay. Though Rosie is initially occupied with a large pile of stuffed animals, she discovers that they’re far more fun to throw than to play with. 

8:34 am: Rosie runs out of toys to throw. 

8:36 am: Sherlock has an idea. 

8:43 am: Sherlock digs through the cupboards and produces an unopened box of baking soda and a half-empty bottle of vinegar. He finds one of Rosie’s plastic bowls and sets it on her high chair’s table. He sifts a thin layer on baking soda into the bowl. Then, he pours the vinegar. 

8:45 am: The fun begins. 

Rosie squeals in delight and shoves both palms into the frothing mess. Sherlock takes her enjoyment as an opportunity to explain acid-base reactions. (“The sodium bicarbonate acts as a base, accepting a proton from the acetic acid, producing water and carbon dioxide gas.” In response to Rosie’s gurgles, he clarifies, “Bubbles.”) 

9:06 am: Mrs. Hudson mistakes Rosie’s playful shrieks for screams, enters the flat, and assumes that Sherlock has let Rosie play with his latest experiment. She is set to rights before she can make good on her very inventive (spoons were involved) threat to Sherlock’s person. 

9:25 am: Sherlock washes his hands. (Very important, when handling acidic chemicals, human remains, small children, or all three in combination.) Then, he washes Rosie’s. He, with some help from Mrs. Hudson, puts Rosie in her carrier, secured to his chest. (It requires some adjustment, as John had worn it last.) Rosie still smells like vinegar. 

9:36 am: The first client of the day arrives in a dusty overcoat, with alarmingly long fingernails and dyed hair with grey roots. The client does not seem to either notice or care that Sherlock conducts their entire session with a baby strapped to his front. 

11:05 am: The second client, a teenager in a hoodie emblazoned with the logo of a Norwegian heavy metal band, spends half the meeting cooing over Rosie. “She’s got your eyes,” the client says. “Her mother’s, actually,” Sherlock corrects, exhaling sharply. 

11:37 am: The second client leaves. Sherlock takes a quick break to change Rosie’s diaper. 

11:54 am: Perhaps not so quick a break. Even with all the practice he’s had in recent months, it takes Sherlock three tries to wrangle Rosie, then get the damn sticky tabs on the diaper to stick in place. They seem to want to stick everywhere- the carpet, Rosie’s belly, Sherlock’s fingers- aside from where they’re supposed to. _John probably doesn’t have this problem,_ Sherlock thinks begrudgingly. 

12:15 pm: Sherlock puts Rosie in her high chair again and feeds her lunch- a baby food jar of peas and a pouch of pulverized fruit. Half of it winds up on his shirt when she spits it out. He can’t blame her- he’s never been terribly fond of peas himself. Since he still isn’t on a case he makes himself a bread sandwich. (He hasn’t bought groceries in a while.) 

12:52 pm: Sherlock returns Rosie to her carrier so he may continue with his experiment. She keeps trying to put her hands in the buckets of organs and acid. 

1:03 pm: Sherlock gives it up as a lost cause and returns to scouring his blog for cases instead. 

3:05 pm: Sherlock realizes that Rosie has fallen asleep. He moves her to her play crib and surrounds her with stuffed bacteria. _In case she wakes up and needs something to play with,_ he tells himself. 

3:32 pm: Client number three arrives. She’s well dressed ( _lawyer, going off of the briefcase and the shoes,_ his mind supplies helpfully. Her case is personal rather than professional- it requires… discretion. It’s also the most interesting case he’s heard all day. He finds himself intrigued- it’s a case that could involve actual legwork, leaving the flat and everything. Might even be as high as a six. 

3:57 pm: He’s on a roll- his mouth isn’t quite keeping up with his brain, but it’s trying its best. The client’s eyes are bright- god, but he loves the ones who can keep up- and her lips are pressed in a tight, focused line. He’s missed this, the rush of a real case, the intrigue, he feels on the verge of something brilliant when- 

3:58 pm: Rosie lets out an ear piercing cry that abates into a painfully shrill wail. Sherlock panics for a moment, afraid of losing his train of thought, equally afraid of not being able to calm her. The first fear has an easy solution: he simply keeps talking. He has to raise his voice to be heard, but his thoughts are still flowing freely. The second fear is less easily quelled. Carefully, he fits his hands under her arms and lifts her from the crib. She begins to quiet almost immediately. Without breaking speed, he outlines the details of the case, while gently rocking from his left foot to his right, Rosie secured against his hip. Gradually, she quiets. With his left hand he gently brushes her hair back, as he’s seen John do. He watches her as he speaks to the client, eyes fixed on Rosie’s feathery tufts of hair, the tears drying on her red face. He dries her face with his thumb ( _she’s still so small_ ). When he’s finished speaking, deductions falling from his lips on autopilot, he looks at the client. Her eyebrows are raised,but she’s smiling- impressed in spite of herself. 

4:14 pm: The client shakes his hand when she leaves, after he’s returned Rosie to her carrier, hanging on his chest. “Thank you,” she says. She has a knack for eye contact- one of those stares that makes you quiet down and listen. Rosie is cooing happily from her carrier. “Your daughter?” the woman asks. “My partner’s,” Sherlock says, and doesn’t specify. “Your partner is a lucky man, Mr. Holmes,” she tells him, and winks her goodbye. 


End file.
